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So late as March 26 1804 President Cleveland said in a Message to Con

gress:

“I hope a way will present itself in the near future for the adjustment of our monetary affairs in such a comprehensive and conservative manner as will afford to silver its proper place in our currency."

Honesty in politics and in legislation demands that the foregoing distinct, formal, and solemn pledges be carried out, and that a Bill be passed by Congress and signed by the President to utilize gold and silver upon substantially equal terms as standard

money.

If they cannot agree upon a Bill for this purpose it is their bounden duty to appoint a commission of competent experts to investigate and to recommend a plan.

PART V.

SARATOGA FREE-COINAGE

DEBATE.

LETTERS TO "SPRINGFIELD REPUBLICAN."

AFTER THE ELECTION, WHAT?

EXTRACTS FROM THE DEBATE ON FREE COINAGE OF SILVER, BEFORE THE AMERICAN SOCIAL SCIENCE ASSOCIATION AT SARATOGA, SEPTEMBER 6, 1895.

From the Introductory Remarks by the Secretary of the Finance Department, Professor F. W. Fenks.

The silver question has become the important topic of the day, and is likely to be the most important question of the next political campaign. It has been thought best, therefore, to have the matter talked out to-day before the Association by some of the best authorities on both sides that the country affords; and the debaters have agreed to let the question take the specific form:

Resolved, That the United States should provide, by law, for free coinage of silver at the ratio of 16 to 1 with gold.

From Address of Hon. A. F. Warner.

Twenty-five years ago there were not forty millions of people out of the entire population of the world using gold exclusively as money :

to-day there are more than three hundred million such people.

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In 1869 Mr. David A. Wells made a report for 1868, stating our debt abroad-I do not mean the government debt alone-at $1,500,000,Professor Cairnes, a few years later, put our debt to England alone at £300,000,000 (which was about the same thing), and the average interest, dividends, etc., including what was then spent abroad by travellers, at $175,000,000 a year. If we start with that, and add the annual interest that we are now to pay, and what has probably been expended by travellers abroad, and for the carrying trade, and deduct the balances in our favor from those against us, we should find that our debt to-day is more than $5,000,000,000. Upon that we have the authority of Professor Thorold Rogers. We have this statement direct from him, as well as from Mr. Gladstone, that the investments of England alone in other countries are more than $10,000,000,000. Certainly 40 per cent. of that is invested in the United States. Mr. Heidelbach, one of the large exporters of gold from New York, in the February Forum placed our annual dues abroad at $350,000,000-$75,000,000 as interest, $75,000,000 as dividends, $100,000,000 expended by travellers, and $100,000,000 in the carrying trade.

From Remarks of Hon. Fusiah Patterson.

.

The silver dollar stands on a somewhat different footing. It is coined money. It is not

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